The Flash, ‘Therefore I Am’: Season’s Big-Bad Gets an Origin Story — Just a Week Before the Wedding!

The Flash is still having to maneuver around filming the crossover, so much of the screen time is devoted to fleshing out the backstory of The Thinker and the Mechanic. Here’s everything you need to know about the latest episode of The Flash:

What’s the scoop: Clifford DeVoe wasn’t always an evil genius. Once he was a mild-mannered history professor with big ideas and a need for a lot of power to fuel them. He comes up with a helmet designed to enhance his mental ability just as STAR Labs was going online. His wife figures out Wells’ plan to blow the reactor, so they position themselves to flip the switch on the helmet. Much the way Barry was hit by lightning, DeVoe gets zapped too, and it supercharges his intellect — at a price. DeVoe starts losing motor function in his limbs, and he determines that his supercharged brain is stealing the functions that keeps his nerves in other parts of his body functioning. It gives him a supercharged form of ALS and confines him to the Future Chair, which helps slow the degradation.

Meanwhile in B-plot Land: Much of the secondary action surrounds Barry’s relentless investigation of DeVoe – just a week before the wedding! It gets him in hot water with his boss — just a week before the wedding! His dogged pursuit of a seemingly nice and disabled man even causes tension with Team Flash — just a week before the wedding! Barry gets everyone back on the same page after a tense confrontation with DeVoe and the discovery of the camera inside the robot head — just a week before the wedding!

Metahumans being meta: Marvel Comics still exist in The Flash‘s universe because Barry talks about his “Spidey Sense” to Iris. The show also reconstructs the events of the first season, with Thawne as Wells giving Mrs. DeVoe a knowing wink and nod during a press conference.

What about the action: There hardly was any. For the second time this season, Barry barely uses his powers and doesn’t even get in his suit.

GIF quote of the week:

What’s next: Something tells me Barry is getting married next week.

Last impressions: While this episode wasn’t necessarily bad, it wasn’t exactly exciting. They didn’t even bother to try to tell very many jokes as Barry was seriously scurrying about town trying to connect the dots with DeVoe, who pulls a page from the Damien Darhk-Prometheus playbook from Arrow by taking a week off because Barry’s calendar next week is full — full of wedding! This episode would be completely frustrating if it weren’t for the fact we were given a glimpse of how our patience was being rewarded.

This ep made me want to quit the show. If the season finale isn’t AMAAAAZING, I probably will.

Let’s run down my issues with this episode:
1. Barry “Turned in a Cop Because He Did the Wrong Thing for the Right Reasons” Allen is now breaking into houses because he’s spooked by a potential enemy.
2. Barry has forgotten that some homes have surveillance cameras. Instead of wearing a mask or blurring his face or looking for evidence at super speed (which he is completely capable of — why would he EVER do something at normal speed when people aren’t watching?), he walks around, fully exposed like a complete IDIOT.
3. Singh calls Barry into his office WITH THE WEEPING COMPLAINANT still in there.
4. Singh does not fire Barry. And no one finds it the least bit suspicious that Marlize DeVoe doesn’t demand that he do so. Or at least file breaking and entering charges. She has ironclad evidence.
5. Despite being reprimanded by Singh and having two official complaints on his record, Barry STILL decides to go and see DeVoe. At which point DeVoe spills ALLLLLL the beans.
6. Everyone gives Barry perfectly valid reasons why he should drop the DeVoe thing for the time being or at least NOT pursue it this hard, but the second he turns out to be right, they completely roll over and are like, “You were right and all of your actions to this point have been completely rational and justifiable.”
7. WHY was it necessary for Cisco to write DeVoe’s villain moniker on the board?
8. Why is the Mechanic’s hair always slicked back? What if someone rings the doorbell? It makes no sense for her to do that every time she enters the lab. Can’t be for sanitation reasons because she leaves it down. She probably has to vacuum her strays off the floor every day.
9. When Clifford starts seizing, she cries out that he’s been unplugged for too long, which makes it seem like he really needs to get plugged back in post-haste, but then she decides it’s the perfect opportunity to stop what she’s doing and slowly and tenderly gaze into his eyes and tell him that she’s nothing without him. Girl, PLUG HIM BACK INTO HIS LIFE SOURCE ‘and THEN whisper your sweet nothings.
10. They are being very cagey about when the West-Allen wedding is. I’ll be completely shocked — SHOCKED, I tell you — when it actually goes down.